FG Reduces Import Duties on 115 items

The Federal Government, has reviewed the import duites of some categories of goods into the ountry.

This was communicated by the Minister of Finance, Mrs. Kemi Adeosun, during a media parley correspondent in Abuja on Wednesday, she said the policy was well thought and meant to promote the domestic sector of the Nigeria economy.

Items Placed Banned List

Some of them are refined vegetable oil, cocoa butter, spaghetti/noodles, fruit juice in retail packs, bagged cement, soaps and detergent, mosquito repellent coils, corrugated paper and paper boards, telephone recharge cards and vouchers, carpets and rugs, all types of footwear, bags and suitcases, and used motor vehicles above 15 years from year of manufacture, importation of live or dead birds, waters, liquid dietary supplements and medicament such as paracetamol tablets and syrup, chloroquine tablets and syrup, among others

An analysis of the import adjustment tax list, which contains 173 items, shows that the Federal Government has given approval for the reduction of 26 of them, while it left the tariffs on 144 items unchanged.

Items reduced From 10% to 5%

items in the national list whose import duties were reduced from 10 per cent to five per cent are milk and cream; tea; fats of sheep or goat; malt extract; tomatoes prepared or preserved by vinegar; under natured ethyl alcohol for medical, pharmaceutical or scientific purpose; petroleum oils and oils obtained from bitumen minerals other than crude.

In the same vein, the government also approved a reduction from 10 per cent to five per cent for tubes, pipes, hoses, sheets, foil, tape, polyethylene, paper and paper board, yarn, synthetic staple fibres, semi-finished products of iron or non-alloy steel, stranded wire ropes, and completely knocked down or unassembled for the assembly industry.

Items reduced From 20% to 10%

For items such as automatic circuit breakers, switches, lamp-holders, electrical apparatus for switching or protecting electrical circuits, the Federal Government gave an approval for the reduction of their import duties from 20 per cent to 10 per cent.

Items with Zero Import Duty

For machineries and equipment used in sectors such as agriculture, cement, hospitality, power, iron and steel, solid minerals, textile and aviation, the government, according to the circular, approved a zero import duty.

Before the approval, the import duties for machineries and equipment used in these sector were put at five per cent.